“I was appalled to find that these comments were manipulated, i.e. ghost created and run by IBN’s own team, all those dubious comments seem to reflect the sentiments and to show and thrust the fact that people are for ‘LOBBYING’ and they support ‘LEGALISING LOBBYING’,” wrote one blogger.

“If they are as perceived to be, this is a clear breach of trust and honesty and a clear evidence of media manipulating and directing Public opinion, which is illegal, dishonest and unethical and could be ascam by itself, this is a dangerous trend clearly a propaganda strategy for deception.”

The blogger also posted the screenshots of five Twitter accounts (@t_mayank, @bhumika_14, @maira_t12, @harish_p and @kala_s) that CNN-IBN ran on the show, to show that the handles were indeed blank.

Sardesai, who is CNN-IBN’s editor-in-chief, responded twice on Twitter since the story gained steam.

11 Comments

Ibnlive.com admins can go to their site dashboard and post these comments in backdate. No big deal. Who is Sardesai trying to fool? Lobbying is not illegal in India. To say lobbying should be legalised is a smokescreen meant to deflect attention. It’s a way of saying nothing illegal has happened in the Radia tapes.

No doubt, it is a deliberate act. Even in his first tweet mentioned above, Sardesai says that they were taken from ibnlive.com feedback, but attributed to twitter. But the cnn ibn’s so called apology is silent on it.

It is very clear that they knowingly cimmitted this mistake. It is also clear, from his second tweet (where he says “chill”), that he or his channel doesn’t care about this.